A Weekend full of fun, fuel and Austin Healeys!

The 13th and 14th of November marked round 10 and 11 of the Isle of Wight Car Club Autotest Championship.

The autotest championship focuses on forward only autotests which mainly consists of short sharp courses on both sealed and unsealed surfaces, the track layout is set out by a sea of cones, which competitors are required to follow, in most cases and requires no more than the use of mainly 1st or sometimes 2nd gear. Every type of car you can imagine enters, from championship rally cars to daily drivers, it doesn’t always come down to speed, to complete the course in the most efficient way it is usually the more ‘boring’ consistent driving that wins the day – although everyone loves to see a good slide around a cone! But it usually won’t win you any points. It is a great way to learn car control and gain confidence in grass roots motorsport before spreading your wings further afield. If you would like to know more please visit https://iowcc.co.uk/ everyone is really friendly and many of the competitors have rally, hillclimb and track driving experience so please do not shy away from asking for advice or help as someone is always on hand to spare a few seconds of wisdom!

My weekend started off Saturday morning at BAE, Cowes around 8.30am, assisting the club in setting up for the day and ensuring a safe course for drivers, marshalls and spectators. Sign on was a 9am and the scrutineering began, once everyone had received their scrutineering passes and the ‘Healey boys’ from the mainland had arrived, some in their Healeys and some sporting their track set up MK1 Mx5s (the guys from the mainland have amazingly kept the tradition of coming over for the weekend for almost 60 years!!) after a few final checks, the day was ready to start.

The autotests usually consist of 6 rounds, usually lasting around an average of 60 seconds per driver; so you have 6 sessions to learn the course and put in a decent time, any wrong moves around a cone counts as a wrong test (WT) and is not scored, the marshalls will let you know this and so will your mates when you get back to the pits and have a bit of a laugh! There was a total of 47 drivers competing at this event and as you can imagine it took a while to get through us all but it is worth it for the 60secs fuelled fun you get to have, especially when you realise that you are out doing your mate!

This course was a little more daunting than normal as the land owner had decided that the day we were driving was a good day to run a hose pipe pouring out running water right across the track! Some drivers were looking a little bit concerned however many of the rear wheeled drive competitors such as myself had a cheeky grin on their face looking forward to the slides! I enjoy the BAE course, it is one of my favourite sealed events in the calendar and I managed to run consistent average times throughout the day without the issue of too many slides or spins thankfully (the mx5 usually likes to step out and surprise me when I’m a bit heavy right footed!!) I usually start my day off driving Miss Daisy for the first couple of laps and build my times up over the day.

By round 4 the day was getting bitterly cold, typically right as I had to start marshalling! It’s always a good opportunity to be able to marshall as it enables you to see where others may go wrong or gain speed in places that you hadn’t considered and plus it’s always good to watch someone well and truly wipe out a cone! By the end of round 6 everyone was getting a bit chilly and was ready to get their final runs it and call it a day. The end of the sessions are always followed by a tidy up by the competitors and then onto a small trophy presentation for those who came first, second and third overall/ fastest lady of the day and fastest youth driver of the day.

It was then onto day two of Healey weekend at the IOW college, who kindly let IOWCC use their carpark as an event – a carpark…yes I know it sounds boring until you consider, trees, hedges, BIG kurbs, walls, lampposts etc… you have to successfully complete your course, in a good time, without taking out any of the immovable objects and your car! Many cars around the IOW college have looked a little sorry for themselves after making friends with the kurbs!

This day was fairly similar to the day before, around 47 drivers competing once again however it was a bit warmer so that made everyone a little more cheery whilst waiting around! We only managed to get in 4 rounds for this event as it is a tradition that there is an award ceremony at a local venue following the event from both the IOWCC members and the Healy members which is nice for everyone to be able to catch up outside of the testosterone and petrol fuelled atmosphere of the pits!

Again I ran some average times, not bad for a mad lady in a RWD car around obstacles! The college usually isn’t one of my favourite events as I generally prefer the more open and unsealed ones with the Mazda but this year I really enjoyed it, I can feel that I am now finally gelling with the twitchy MX5 and how it likes to lure me into a false sense of security – I’ve sussed out its naughty tricks now!

The awards afternoon was a nice final touch to the weekend and it was great to see the Healey boys and nice to hear about what they’d been up to over in the big wide world of Englandshire!

The next event is on the 28th of November, at Ventnor Botanical Gardens, the final round of the championship this yearL!! But it usually goes out with a bang! Being one of the most complex and tight courses on the calendar. If this sounds like something you would enjoy please come along, even just to spectate and who knows we may be competing side by side at next years championship!

Watch this space!! Don’t forget to head over to my Youtube channel (linked at the bottom of my blog) please like and subscribe. You can also follow my adventures on both four wheels and two @Blondie_bikerk6.

Thanks for reading!

Thanks to JMR Media for this image.

Thanks to Allan Marsh for this image.